Keywords

Dynamic Career Adaptability, Mediating Role of Dynamic Career, Positive Relationship

Introduction

Work Engagement is a challenge for business organizations because it is currently a major factor in maintaining competitive advantage by having strategic resources that are difficult to replicate, as one of the competitive advantage resources (Albrecht, Bakker, Gruman, Macey & Saks, 2015) also determines employee performance (Christian Christian, Garza & Slaughter, 2011; Knight, Patterson & Dawson, 2017), moderating the desire to quit the organization (Gupta & Shaheen, 2017), lowering turn-overs (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004), even influential in relation with the organization's financial returns (Xanthopoulou, Bakker, Demerouti & Schaufeli, 2009). Consumers’ demand for safe and environmentally friendly products is increasing throughout the world. Organizations are responding by becoming more sustainable.

Scholars executed much investigation to understand the precursors of work engagement, defined by Maslach, Schaufeli & Leiter (2001)) as the opposite of burnout. A person engaged in work eliminates burnout because loyal employees will be energetic, productive at work. There is no pressure, and employees will appreciate their work as a challenge. Schaufeli, Salanova, Gonzalez-Roma & Bakker (2002) define work engagement more precisely. The most outstanding definition of work engagement is a positive, satisfying, work-related mentality characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption.

COVID-19 pandemic has brought many impacts, including to the Work Engagement (WE) in the work environment. Communications with supervisors as well as other stakeholders in organization nowadays have been done virtually through video conferences, turning physical interaction to non-physical interaction. From this perspective, the predictors of work engagement are the influence of Perceived Organizational Support (POS) and Perceived Supervisor Support (PSS), The POS and PSS brings a significant impact to the work engagement of employees in an organization (Burns, 2016).

However, studies explaining factors sustaining the employees’ work engagement facing the disruptive era and utilizing this situation to win the competition with career management are still limited. Hamid (2019) showed the importance of Human Resources Management to sustain competitive advantage in the VUCA business environment, this had certainly challenged the organization itself to change its traditional way of working and thinking and required the human to learn from the failure and become adaptive to this era. Therefore, this research aims to fill in this gap by studying the effect of POS and PSS on work engagement mediated by dynamic career adaptability, a construct that link the employee dynamically adapt with their career as a consequence of employees to prepare their performance facing this VUCA environment.

This research analyzes the following research questions:

1.Does POS have a positive effect on work engagement?

2.Does PSS have a positive effect on work engagement?

3.Does POS have a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability?

4.Does PSS have a positive impact on dynamic career adaptability?

5.Does dynamic career adaptability have a positive effect on work engagement?

6.Does POS have a positive effect on PSS?

This research attempts to facilitate human resources management practitioners to understand on how to improve their employees’ work engagement in relation to POS and PSS and implement several measures to fix and reduce turnover rate. Besides, this research also aims to introduce a new conceptual model to fill in the gap of the inconclusive results on the effect of POS and PSS on work engagement.

Literature Review

Work Engagement

Vigor, dedication and absorption refer to positive and satisfying career characteristics of highly engaged employees (Schaufeli, Salanova, GonzalesRoma & Bakker, 2002). Employees who have great physical and psychological endurance (resilience) in difficult working conditions, are willing to fight seriously at work, and make unremitting dedication in the face of difficulties, that is why employees have strong personalities. When the character consistently exhibits feelings of passion, enthusiasm, inspiration, pride, and challenge, he provides a high level of dedication. At the same time, if they are completely absorbed and interested in their work until it feels like time is passing quickly, they are very focused on the work.

Bakker & Demerouti (2007) examined why someone feeling bored with their work while others were very enthusiastic. Their research indicates that job demand and job resources factors influenced this condition. They developed Job Demand Resources Theory (JD-R Theory) that tries to explain various work conditions, both positive and negative indicators, concerning the welfare and health of employees. They can be applied to various types of work, including various efforts to improve professional welfare and performance.

According to the JD-R Theory, job demand causes health problems related to excessive workloads. Forms of job demand include jobs with high pressure, unfavorable environmental conditions, relationships with demanding customers, changes in tasks, and job ambiguity. All factors leading to physical and psychological health problems can be categorized under the job demand.

The work engagement will only occur if the employees' job resources are higher than their job demands; otherwise, they will feel burnout (Bakker & Demerouti, 2007). In conclusion, Schaufelli, (2002) defined the work engagement as the antithesis of burnout (Maslach, Wilmar, Schaufeli & Leiter, 2001). Further, the work engagement can likewise perceive as the entirely of individual mentalities towards work that is started by sure, proactive, satisfying, and psychological ingestion perspectives, changed into lively full of feeling mentalities, has a hard-working attitude more than anticipated and is constantly tested to accomplish the best presentation, shown in a committed disposition (conduct demeanour) that would stay away from the event of wear out burn-out of the job.

Perceived Organizational Support

Based on Social Exchange Theory (Homans, 1958), the Perceived Organizational Support (POS) is defined as a construct that indicates the employees’ feeling that their organization appreciates their contributions and their well-being (Eisenberger, Stinglhamber, Vandenberghe, Sucharski & Rhoades, 2002; Khrisnan & Mary, 2012). When the employees are confident with their organization support whenever they face a problem or achieve a great achievement link with their well-being, there will be an increment of POS. As a result, the employee will improve their performance and contribution to the company as stated in the social exchange theory.

Rhoades & Eisenberger (2002) emphasized that the POS will improve the employees’ performance on regular job activities and take extraordinary actions than their duties. Furthermore, Eisenberger, Malone & Presson (2016) suggested that effective leadership, implementation of beneficial HR rules, desired job conditions, and fair treatment would bring impact on the POS. For this reason, the organizations – especially the supervisors - need to establish policies and practices, directly or indirectly to improve the POS.

Perceived Supervisor Support

Kottke & Sharafinski (1988) explained that perceived supervisor support (PSS) is a general view of members of the organization to supervisors in assessing their contribution and paying attention to their well-being. The employees will support their supervisors when they believe that the supervisors assess their contributions, assist, and care about their welfare (Cole, Bruch & Vogel, 2006; Eisenberger, 2002; House, 1981). Besides, Babin & Boles (1996) emphasized that the PSS also explains how employees feel when supervisors voluntarily provide resources and assistance so that the employees can perform better at work. Further, Burns (2016) concluded that by PSS, the employees assess the role of supervisors directly as agents of the company, and when the interaction is well-maintained, there will be positive interactions and an increase in the work engagement.

Previous researchers studied the difference between PSS and POS. They mainly explained that the PSS indicates that the supervisors – as the agent of organization – do not only support their subordinates by providing internal resources from the organization, but also arises from their responsibility to directly evaluate the performance of their members (Burns 2016, Eisenberger, 2002). Referring to Eisenberger (2002), supervisors highly favored in the organization will have the highest PSS according to the employees which brings positive effect on the relationship between PSS and POS.

Employees' understanding of the supervisor's evaluation and results is the same as that of organization evaluation. Evaluation influences management's perception of employee performance, So PSS influences POS in this situation. The strength of PSS depends on recognizing the supervisor's organization when the supervisor is highly valued and treated well by the organization. Employees believe that the supervisor's personality will be consistent with the organization's personality, which will affect POS (Eisenberg, 2002).

Dynamic Career Adaptability

Career development facilitated by the organization for its employees shows the organization's willingness and efforts to respect them. It shows the organization's efforts to develop potential employees who have the skills to grow together to advance the business by providing an adequate and quality career development outline (Foong-Ming, 2008). Holtschlag, (2020) concluded that the employees consider their careers based on their values (protean career orientation) which will affect their intention to leave the organization. However, it depends on the individual goals and are moderated by their perception of the organization's role in their career management.

The career development strategies are no longer dependent on one's social capital and informal network. They are developed based on the organization's need for an integrated career management system and aim to form the best system. In relation to the changes from the traditional system implementing a long-term career path management to a career cycle with a short-term learning cycle, the employees still find it important to begin a new career exploration although they have been able to work and achieve a high level of mastery in their work and are almost near the end of learning cycle (Lee, 2016).

The constructs of career adaptability were developed by Savickas (1997) who defined it as the readiness to face predictable tasks in preparing for and participating in work roles and with adjustments driven by changes in the work and unpredictable working conditions. Savickas (2009) also conveyed how to answer the question of "How can individuals design their own lives well in the community groups in which they live, especially related to facing the changes in the 20^th century?"

The adaptation to a career described by Savickas (2009) which emphasized more on the mental readiness to social influences (psychosocial) to face changes (Savickas, 2005) rather than on the action.

In this present study, the dynamic career adaptability emphasizing the importance of each professional to cope with time rather than to wait for changes in their career and take action is used. It is defined as the professional ability to self-regulate and the capacity to solve unusual, complex, and unclear problems of the development of tasks which require extraordinary skills and job transfer with work trauma along with continuous, productive, and energetic efforts to move quickly and adapt easily to new circumstances so that the time required to reach a comfortable condition and to comply with organizational and professional needs can be accelerated.

The objectives of dynamic career adaptability are as follow:

1.To make the time required for adaptation to changes in business condition more effective, considering that the employees are the organization resource for creating competitive advantages.

2.To create a proactive behavior from both the organization and employees which are enthusiastic and passionate in adapting to the changes in business conditions, the organization needs to facilitate them with comprehensive career structures which are also challenging and flexible for them. Meanwhile, the employees are also suggested to leave their comfort zone, take new responsibility, behave proactively and be willing to share knowledge and experiences with fellow employees and supervisors.

3.To encourage the organization to facilitate their employees by providing trainings, learning and knowledge-sharing sessions. It is done as they need to catch up with new knowledge to explore actions required to adapt through self-assessment, examining their abilities and taking notes from the experts to improve the organization’s performance.

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Hypotheses

Perceived Organizational Support and Work Engagement

Eisenberger (1986) indicated that POS depends on the employees' view of the organization's intentions or objectives when it supports them, whether profitable or not for it. The POS initiates a social exchange process where the employees feel obliged to help the organization achieving its goals and objectives and expect a big reward from the increase in their efforts. It is consistent with the Social Exchange Theory (SET) that an organization as an employer has the resources and is expected to provide support to their employees to become the irreplaceable resources as the organization’s competitive advantage.

Many scholars researched the influence of POS on work engagement, such as Cherubin (2012). He concluded that there was no relationship between these two constructs, and even if there was, the relationship was weak. He also emphasized that this relationship needed further research because the relationship of POS and work engagement depended on the strong absence of employees’ POS.

Similarly, Murty (2017); Najeemdeen, Abidemi, Rahmat & Bulus (2018) examined the impact of POS on work engagement. Murty (2017) did the research with managers as the subject and concluded that there was a significant and positive relationship. Meanwhile, Najeemdeen (2018) used academic staff in the School of Business as the subject and also found a significantly and positively relationship between the two constructs. Further, Najeemdeen (2018) emphasized that it was important for the university management to have a close relationship with the academic staff so that they felt supported. The academic staff's perception of their management would boost the staff's motivation and willingness to involve themselves in any work.

The organization's role can be manifested as improved job resources, such as providing resources necessary for the employees to solve the problems, assisting them with a supervisor who can assist in solution-based problems, providing a significant career development, and conducting a dynamic organizational restructuring. Based on the JD-R Theory (Bakker and Demerouti, 2007), the improvement of job resources will bring impacts in decreasing the job demand, and simultaneously improve the work engagement. Therefore, the POS will have a positive effect on work engagement.

H1: POS has a positive effect on work engagement

Perceived Supervisor Support and Work Engagement

The social exchange theory explained that the full support of a supervisor to the employees would make them more passionate, dedicated, and fully concentrated on their work. This is because what is given by the supervisor is considered as a manifestation of the organizational policy, so that the employees will give back to the organization through their performance (Eisenberger, 2002; Levinson, 1965).

Similarly, when the supervisors give more support to the employees, they will improve their work engagement (Burns, 2016; Khattak, Batool, Rehman, Fayaz & Asif, 2017). Further, the supervisors who demonstrate support to the employees will give feedback on the performance, autonomy, and professional experience sharing. The supports are done continuously and will impact in improving the employees’ personal resources and their job resources. Following the JD-R theory, when the personal resources and job resources are improved, the job demand will be reduced, and feeling burnout will be released from the employees and consequently, the work engagement will be improved (Bakker & Demerouti, 2007; Schaufeli & Salanova, 2007).

A study of teachers in Turkey's senior high schools by Gülbahar (2020) emphasized that the PSS of teachers would result to more efforts to develop their schools because they would be more committed to their school's organizations. Therefore, PSS is expected to influence the work engagement positively.

H2: PSS has a positive effect on work engagement

Perceived Organizational Support and Dynamic Career Adaptability

The organizational support for the employees in the form of awards for achievements exceeding the determined targets can be done by preparing dynamic Human Resource (HR) programs where the dynamic refers to how they respond to the needs and changes in business conditions. One of the important HR programs is to pay attention to the career development of those who excel.

In this context, the dynamic is related to time, such as an accelerated career program can be carried out with a clear and transparent scheme. The employees can achieve the highest position without any limitation as long as they show their best performance, and there is a career scheme to allow them to join an internal recruitment of a department or division that needs additional members. Each scheme is prepared with a mature promotion strategy by implementing a rotation system integrated with a remuneration system that combines position and job benefits. If their performance does not improve, there can be a decrease in position and a reduction in benefits and vice versa.

The employees in such organizations are intense to achieve a dynamic career adaptability by increasing awareness, being able to accept any changes and adapt as energetic and as quickly as possible (Dynamic Concern), being able to control responsibly and adapt proactively to understand the skills of a new career (Dynamic Control), having the curiosity of understanding one's potential dynamically through sharing in various situations (Dynamic Curiosity) and self-confidence to strengthen skills in new careers by proactively examining one's abilities and continuous improvement (Dynamic Confidence).

Refering to the Career Construction Theory (CCT), the employees will build their career by forcing their contribution to their work experience (Savickas, 2005). During their work experience in an organization, they also need to have a good perception of organizational support. Otherwise, they will not be motivated to show their best support to the organization, so their careers are not well-built. Based on the description above, the third hypothesis that can be developed is

H3: POS has a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability.

Perceived Supervisor Support and Dynamic Career Adaptability

Perceived Supervisor Support (PSS) is different from POS. The PSS is specifically focused on how the supervisors provide resources to the employees with support as the agent of organization. Considering that the supervisors act as the agents of organization with the responsibility to direct and assess the employees’ performance, the employees are also able to consider whether their superiors are good and supportive or not in supporting the organization overall (Eisenberger, 1986; Levinson, 1965). In addition, the employees also understand that when the supervisors evaluate them, the results are reported to the management and will affect the management’s perspective toward the organization overall. Therefore, the PSS affects the employees’ POS (Burns, 2016).

One most recent study of PSS found that there was no difference between individual factors such as demographics variable of gender and employment status which would influence the results although the total measurement of PSS would be viewed differently by the individuals (Gordon, Adle & Day, 2019). Further, the dynamic career adaptability needs to be led by the supervisors as representatives of an organization- as Gordon (2019) concluded - by paying attention to individual factors, the perceived supervisor support will bring different effect to each professional. The set explains that when the employees have a good PSS, they will reciprocate it by performing their best adaptation with their career even show a dynamically adaptation. Therefore, PSS will have a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability.

H4: PSS has a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability.

Dynamic Career Adaptability and Work Engagement

Several studies have shown that work engagement is the result of adaptation in a career, therefore the employees must have the ability to adapt to their career to increase the work engagement, especially when the job is a new job for them who are rotated or promoted due to rapid business changes (Hirschi, 2012; Maggiori, Johnston, Krings, Massoudi & Rossier, 2013; Xie, 2016). The process experienced will lead to absorption, enthusiasm, dedication and if this needs to be done with high dynamics and following the JD-R theory, it will increase the personal resources and job resources and ultimately increase work involvement.

Meanwhile, Gupta (2019) examines employees who had no boundaries and working time (liquid professional), confirming the influence of career adaptation on work engagement as a mediator of career adaptation on the work performance. It was concluded that the career adaptability improved the performance by providing the employees with the need to demonstrate their ability to adapt to career changes and the likelihood of success in their career by matching them with their goals.

Referring to the JD-R Theory, when an individual receives any resources, he or she will improve their job resources and decrease job demand. Simultaneously, it will impact the increment of work engagement. Thus, when the employees are able to adapt with their career dynamically, they will escape from feeling burnout of their job and it will decrease their job demand and improve the work engagement. Therefore, the dynamic career adaptability will bring a positive impact on the work engagement.

H5: Dynamic career adaptability has a positive effect on work engagement

Research Methods

This present study used an online questionnaire distributed to millennial employees whose age ranged from 30 to 45 years old and had a minimum of three years of experience working at consultant firms in Jakarta. The total population reached 25.000 millennial employees. Considering that the population was too big and uncertain, Cochran (1977) suggested the sample could be selected by using a purposive sampling method. A minimum of 272 respondents should participate in this study.

Eisenberger (1986); Kottke & Sharafinski (1988) utilized the Survey of Perceived Support for Organizations (SPOS) and the Survey of Perceived Support for Supervisors (SPSS) to measure POS and PSS. This research will adapt The SPOS and SPSS. At the same time, the questionnaire on contributions to work was adapted from Schaufeli. The Utrecht Labor Participation Scale (2002) has nine items (UWES9) (Schaufeli, Bakker & Salanova 2006). Also, use the scale to develop and verify the dynamic items of the occupational suitability questionnaire. All items are measured using a 5-point scale, where 1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neutral, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree. Subsequently, PLS-SEM is used as a statistical analysis to determine its validity and reliability.

Results

The questionnaire was distributed to a total of 484 respondents, however only 60.1% (291 respondents) of them returned the filled questionnaire. It happened due to several factors, including the effect of Covid-19 pandemic which only allowed everyone in general to work from home, including the millennial employees. This condition made it difficult to obtain the data as most of consulting offices were not operating. After carefully checking the returned questionnaires, only 281 data that could be used for further analyzing.

The results show that 152 respondents are male (54 %), while 129 respondents are female (46 %). Furthermore, the composition of tenure period is various, ranked as follow: 3-5 years (44 %), 6-10 years (41 %), and more than 10 years (15 %). Meanwhile, the composition of job group composition ranges from associate (44 %), managers (43%), directors (8%), to partners (5%).

Measurement Model

The measurement model examined the validity and reliability prior the structural model evaluation. The validity test measured Average Variance Extracted (AVE) and loadings factors or outer loadings. The AVE value should be higher than 0.5, while the outer loadings should be higher than 0.7 (Hair, 2017).

Below, Table 1. Displays that the AVE value ranges from 0.512 to 0.548, which means that the measurement result is valid. Likewise, the value of the loadings or outer loadings ranges from 0.650 to 0.785, which can be retained (Between 0.5 – 0.7) as long as it can increase the AVE value. Further, the reliability test was done by calculating the Composite Reliability (CR). The results show that the composite reliability value is between 0.840 and 0.879 and had passed the required minimum value of 0.7 (Hair, 2017).

Table 1  Analysis of Outer Model
Construct and Items		Outer Loading	Decision
Work Engagement /WE (CR=0.840; AVE=0.512)
W2.1	At my workplace, I feel full of energy	0.71	Valid
W3.1	I am passionate about my work	0.758
W3.2	My work inspires me to do better things	0.71
W3.3	I am proud of the work I do.	0.702
W4.1	I make maximum use of the results of training, development or feedback from superiors for performance improvement.	0.696
Perceived Organizational Support/POS (CR=0.879; AVE=0.548)
O1.1	The organization in the Consulting office where I work rated my engagement well	0.65	Valid
O1.2	The organization in the Consulting office where I work sets targets and assesses my work well, and assesses my engagement well	0.733
O1.3	The organization in the Consulting office where I work gives awards, if my work targets are achieved	0.772
O1.4	The organization in the Consulting office where I work is proud when I excel at work, giving awards, if my work targets are achieved	0.759
O1.8	The organization in the Consulting office where I work cares about my overall satisfaction at work in the workplace	0.717
O1.9	The organization in the Consultant's office where I work respects and cares for my well-being	0.733
O1.10	The organization in the Consulting office where I work pays attention to the development and continuation of my career.	0.727
Dynamic Career Adaptability/DCA (CR=0.869; AVE=0.525)
D1.2	Professionals recognize that today's choices shape the future and proactively prepare for it	0.6583673	Valid
D1.3	I plan my career with the best education and training options	0.731
D1.4	Professionals pay attention to careers and disciplined to develop themselves immediately	0.785
D2.3	Professionals adapt quickly to work	0.703
D3.1	Professionals explore environmental conditions and their changes quickly	0.714
D3.2	Professionals move looking for opportunities to develop themselves quickly	0.71
Perceived Supervisor Support /PSS (CR=0.867; AVE=0.522)
S1.2	The Superiors set targets and evaluate my work well	0.719	Valid
S1.3	The Superiors give an award. if the work target is achieved	0.76
S1.4	The Superiors are proud when I excel at work	0.716
S1.6	The Superiors try to help when I need it	0.65
S1.10	The Superiors pay attention to career development and continuation.	0.749
S1.8	The Superiors care about general satisfaction in working in the current office	0.735
Note: CR=Composite Reliability; AVE=Average Variance of Extracted

Structural Model

In this stage, the coefficient determinant (R²), collinearity test, and hypothesis testing were done. The higher the R² value, the better the relationship of exogenous constructs on the endogenous constructs predicted by R². Below, Table 2. Shows that the work engagement and dynamic career adaptability has R² of 0.508 and 0.264 respectively. It means that the POS, PSS, and dynamic career adaptability can explain the work engagement by 50.8 % and the rest 49.2% can be explained by other variables not included in the model. Similarly, the POS can explain the dynamic career adaptability by 26.4 % and the rest of 73.6 % can be explained by other variables not included in the model.

Table 2 Evaluation of R2
Endogenous Constructs	R2
Work Engagement	0.264
Dynamic Career Adaptability	0.508

The tendency of collinearity could be indicated by the value of Variance Inflation Factor (VIF). If the VIF value is more than 5, it means that there is a tendency of collinearity (Hair, 2017). Below, Table 3. Presents the VIF value of the model which is smaller than 5.0 and confirms that there is no collinearity on the model.

Table 3 Multi Collinearity Evaluation
As predictorWork Engagement		As predictorDynamic Career Adaptability
Construct	VIF	VIF
Perceived Organizational Support	2.329	2.111
Perceived Supervisor Support	2.139	2.111
Dynamic Career Adaptability	1.358

Further, the hypothesis testing was also carried out to determine whether the hypotheses proposed could be supported empirically or not. Hypothesis testing is then carried out to determine whether the influence between the constructs is supported or not. This study uses a directed hypothesis, and a one-way test will test it; the critical t-value will be 1.65 based on the 5% significance level, so that when the t-value is higher than 1.65, it can be decided concluded that the hypothesis is supported. The following Table 4. Shows the t-value of H1, H3, H4, and H5 which is greater than 1.65, so this hypothesis is making them supported empirically, Meanwhile, H2: proposing that the perceived supervisor support positively affects has a positive effect on the work engagement cannot be supported empirically.

Table 4 Hypothesis Test Result
Hypothesis	ß	t-test	Decision
H1: POS has positive effects on Work Engagement	0.271	3.946	Supported
H2: PSS has positive effects on Work Engagement	0.107	1.505	Not Supported
H3: POS has positive effects on Dynamic Career Adaptability	0.400	5.117	Supported
H4: PSS has positive effect on Dynamic Career Adaptability	0.143	1.819	Supported
H5: Dynamic Career Adaptability has positive effect on Work Engagement	0.462	6.639	Supported
Notes: one tail test, 5 % significant level

The first hypothesis (H1) proposes whether POS has a positive effect on work engagement. Based on the results in Table 4, the t-test is 3.946>1.65, thus H1 is supported empirically. This also confirms that the POS has a positive effect on work engagement with a beta coefficient (ß) of 0.271 in a positive direction. The results are aligned with Cherubin (2012); Burns (2016) who also found similar results. The respondents’ profile shows that most of the employees have worked for three years and more. They were still in a productive age group (millennial generation) and had a crucial role in increasing job resources, especially in dealing with a highly decisive situation primarily because of the COVID-19 pandemic which was started in March 2020 to this present.

The result of this present study is considered an improvement over the study of Cherubin (2012) which still has a gap in his study, while this study indicates an increase in beta coefficient (ß) when dynamic occupational adaptability mediates the influence of organizational support perceptions on work engagement. The millennial employees' perception of the organization's role in their career management would increase their work engagement as in the consulting business; most of the employees would devote themselves for an average of two-thirds of their lives to working in the consulting firm. Therefore, it was natural for them to strive for progress in their careers and to reach the top at the end of their career cycle (Ruky, 2019). Besides, H2 proposes whether the PSS has a positive effect on work engagement. Table 4 shows that the result of t-test is 1.505<1.65, indicating that H2 is not supported. Thus, this study finds that the PSS does not have a positive effect on work engagement with a beta coefficient (ß) of 0.107 in a positive direction. In contrast, Burns (2016) found that there was a positive influence of PSS on work engagement, where the supervisors’ support for the employees was formed until a strong perception was formed, together with perceptions of the role of the organization will increase work engagement (Burns, 2016).

However, this study finds that the PSS does not affect the work engagement. It might occur because of the characteristics of work in the consulting business that were difficult to give a positive perception of a supervisor or a direct supervising from the supervisors to the millennial employees. It was almost impossible to do because it was difficult to have face-to-face meetings between the supervisors and millennial employees. Usually, they would directly communicate with the owner or leader of the project. Moreover, the employees also found it difficult to get direct assistance and instructions from their supervisors and even to follow them easily as they were accustomed to being critical of ideas, especially new ones. The employees’ characteristics also included being easily challenged to solve their problems with their creativity, especially if they had limited time. In addition, the supervisors and employees also worked in the same room and it would be hard for them to interact casually due to differences in professional position at work. Therefore, most of the millennial employees did not have enough experience in interacting with their supervisors in order to improve their work engagement (Ruky, 2019).

Furthermore, H3 proposes whether the POS has a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability. The result in Table 4 shows that the result of t-test is 5.117>1.65, explaining that H3 is supported empirically. Thus, that the POS has a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability with a ß of 0.400 in a positive direction. The result is in line with Ruky (2019) who emphasized the importance of the role of organizations in providing the employees opportunities to develop.

The role of this organization could be categorized as an internal factor (push factor) that caused an employee to want to leave the consulting business that was currently employing him. These internal factors, such as providing challenging career opportunities, would make the professional not want to leave the organization. As explained in the Social Exchange Theory (SET), this was the exchange that the employees gave as a reciprocal exchange as a risk of the relationship between the organization and employees (Homans, 1958).

Further, H4 examines whether the PSS has a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability. The result in Table 4 Shows that the t-test is 1.819<1.65, indicating that H4 is supported, and that the PSS has a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability with a beta coefficient (ß) of 0.143 in a positive direction.

This relationship is in line with related previous research on supervisory support which found that it would give such information and suggestion of work performance and a motivation to strive for a career growth. Such support would assist the employees to control their actual career improvement, adjust to being consistent with their career plans, and reach their goal for continuous improvement and for becoming essential assets of the organization (Ito & Brotheridge, 2005).

Last, H5 examines whether dynamic career adaptability has a positive effect on work engagement. The result in Table 4. Shows that the t-test is 6.639<1.65, showing that H5 is supported empirically and confirming that the dynamic career adaptability has a positive effect on work engagement with a beta coefficient (ß) of 0.462 in a positive direction. The result is in line with Gupta (2019) which concluded that the employees’ abilities and their careers positively affected their performance.

The latent construct of dynamic career adaptability, incorporating a “dynamic” element in adapting, was believed by the millennial employees to adapt proactively, full of enthusiasm and energy to move quickly and easily adapt to circumstances. It required to accelerate time to achieve the right conditions and be suitable for organizational and professional needs. This dynamic adaptation would bring impacts on the work engagement following the self-satisfaction obtained by the employees when they adapted to their career path as soon as possible. Further, this dynamic career adaptation would also reduce or even eliminate the workload caused by the learning curve. According to the JD-R Theory, a decrease in workload (job demand) would reduce the burn-out and bring impacts in increasing the work engagement (Schaufeli, 2002).

Conclusion

As conclusion related the effect of perceived organizational support on work engagement indicate that POS will increases the millennial employees’ work engagement, the perceived supervisor support does not have an effect on work engagement, the perceived organizational support has a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability, so that if the perceived organizational support increased, then the dynamic career adaptability of millennial employees in the consulting business would also increase and vice versa, and finally, the perceived supervisor support has also a positive effect on dynamic career adaptability, so that an increase in the perceived supervisor support would bring an impact on increasing the dynamic career adaptability. The last relationship studied between dynamic career adaptability and work engagement also shows that the dynamic career adaptability has a positive effect on work engagement.

Theoretical Implications

The theoretical implications of this research mainly consist of two points. First, this present research investigates factors that influence the work engagement by paying attention to career-related variables which are still limited in the literature. Thus, this study offers insights on the role of career management in influencing the work engagement and provides a model that can be studied.

The dynamic career adaptability variable on the hypothesis testing, especially the result of t-test, shows that it has increased in the value compared to the direct relationship between POS and work engagement, indicating that it has improved the research model in determining the effect of POS on work engagement, including its mediating role.

Burns (2016) concluded the need to include the Perceived Supervisor Support (PSS) variable to influence the work engagement, but this study has the opposite result. It should be noted that the influence of PSS on work engagement may occur in the target sources whose work forms are more structured and include face-to-face meetings. This shows that the research by Burns (2016) cannot be generalized to every form of work.

Second, the novelty in dynamic career adaptability emphasizes on the action in adapting to careers rather than the psychosocial readiness (Savickas, 2005). This dynamic career adaptability emphasizing on taking action implies that the career adaptability is no longer based on the passive readiness, but must be active in facing Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity (VUCA) on the business. It is important to not only adapt if the changes occur in the professional career but also to be proactive and it should be noted that measurable actions are needed. The results of the valid indicators show the importance of employees in realizing the preparation to adapt to the current job and prepare for the changes in the future.

Managerial Implications

The results of this study indicate that the POS is a variable that affects the work engagement. POS is a construct with the most important position and has the greatest influence on the work engagement. It is also important for the management to provide the necessary job resources for the millennial employees in achieving the targets that have been set, either in the form of policies that can touch the positive emotional side of millennials, such as reducing the frequency of meetings and physical face-to-face meetings, and instead increasing the use of virtual media, web-seminars (webinars), and social media, as well as portals that can increase the internet speed and facilitate the meetings to be more casual and informal, have flexible working time and can be done from home.

It is especially important during this pandemic, if the management can provide internet quota facility, assistance in preparing a comfortable workspace at home, provide vitamins and etc to support the millennial employees in completing their tasks and working in a fitter and faster way with maximum results and to still have time to think about and develop themselves with trainings and other supporting activities. As a result, the employees can have a positive perceived organizational support of their organization, and it will positively increase the work engagement.

The dynamic career adaptability construct is essential in impacting the work engagement construct with a high impact on performance. The most critical indicator from DCA is that professional Millennials intensively pay attention to their careers and are disciplined to develop themselves immediately. Organizations need to pay close attention to professional millennials with precise career planning and needed skills; it would be even better if the training were prepared for acquiring these competencies.

The DCA’s indicator that most influences work engagement performance emphasizes that millennial professionals in this study have planned career targets and prepared themselves with the best education and training. If millennial professionals can increase their career targets and improve their training and education, work engagement will increase.

Limitations and Future Research

This study has several limitations and suggestions for future research as follow:

First, the target respondents of this study are millennial employees who work in consulting businesses in Jakarta. The desire to leave the organization is possible because there are many alternative jobs in the same business field, such as moving to other manufacturing or service industries. Future research is suggested to examine non-metropolitan cities so that the turnover is likely to be lower.

Second, gender is not a control variable in this current research. Thus, the influence of gender on the decision to have a career in an organization cannot be observed further. Future research is suggested to consider gender as the criteria in selecting the respondents.

Last, the PLS-SEM used as the analytical tool has several limitations because it cannot test the feasibility of the research model. Future research is recommended to use CB-SEM for analysis. We encourage you to submit your tables just as you would like them to appear.

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